Page 2 — The Exhaustion That Didn’t Make Sense
When Emma’s teacher called, my stomach dropped before he even finished his first sentence.
“Mrs. Collins,” he said, “Emma has been falling asleep in class. Sometimes she’s hard to wake.”
I felt embarrassed first—the reflex of a parent who thinks she’s failing.
Then I felt fear.
At home, I searched her room for anything obvious:
- A hidden phone
- A game console
- Snacks and energy drinks
- Anything that explained late nights
I found a small flashlight tucked near her pillow.
My first thought was relief: maybe she’s reading under the covers.
But the kind of exhaustion her teacher described didn’t match a few stolen chapters of a book.
I tried to talk to her gently.
She avoided my eyes and repeated the same line in different forms:
